Activists or antagonists: Are Kiev rioters seeking solutions or scuffles?

The Kiev protests began as peaceful anti-government rallies, but have now plunged into a war-like uprising. The question is whether the term “activists” can be used to describe the rioters, whose actions are not inferior to reported police brutality.

Ferocious clashes between rioters and police in Ukraine’s capital
this week have marked a new peak in tensions. In the two months
of protests over the government's refusal to sign an
EU-integration deal, Kiev has not seen anything as fierce or as
violent as the confrontations that have taken place over the past
four days.

Protests reached a heightened frenzy on Sunday, when Ukrainian
President Viktor Yanukovich signed controversial anti-protest
laws. It was then that peaceful demonstrations by
“anti-government protesters” evolved into an uprising by
well-prepared rioters.

Photos from Kiev show near apocalyptic scenes; billowing smoke is
seen emerging from burning tires, cobble stones have been ripped
out by rioters and used in their standoff with police, and lines
of barricades fill the city.

Hundreds of people – both rioters and police officers – have been
injured in the clashes. More than 250 officers have been wounded,
and the Ministry of Internal Affairs estimates that over 100 of
them are in hospital. The opposition claims that on Wednesday
alone, over 300 people sustained wounds in what they said was a
brutal dispersal by Berkut special forces on Grushevskogo Street
- the scene of the most violent confrontation yet.

An RT camera caught a police officer severely beating one the
protesters lying on the ground.

However, footage from the scene shows that rioters were not as
defenceless as they may seem.

Separated by meters-high barricades, protesters and security
forces engaged in a pitched battle, pushing each other up and
down Grushevskogo Street. Police tore down barricades and chased
protesters down the hill from official buildings, but
demonstrators regained their positions.

Law enforcement officers were seen hurling stones thrown by
protesters, as well as occasionally using tear gas, stun
grenades, and rubber bullets against the rioters. The opposition
has blamed the deaths of two people on security forces, though
police officially denied the claims on Thursday, saying the
officers were not armed with guns.

From the other side of the frontline, several dozen men set tires
ablaze in the street, in an effort to block the visibility of
police forces. Rioters hurled an intense barrage of stones and
Molotov cocktails at police. Berkut special police unit were
forced to retreat due to heavy smoke.

But the retreat only encouraged protesters - armed with broken
pieces of masonry, hand grenades, and other improvised weapons -
to continue. Some of the demonstrators launched fireworks at
police.

“I have been at the City Hall just before the proceeding
events – these guys were getting militarized, were getting
mobilized, they were getting ready to go into war,” Graham
Philips, a Ukraine-based journalist, told RT. “They knew
exactly, they were receiving briefings, they were receiving
instructions on the basis of going into war. And they went to
that end to effectively instigate a civil war in Ukraine.”

Previous days of standoff also saw brutality from protesters.
Shocking footage of January 19 clashes showed rioters armed with
sticks and flares attacking cordons of security forces
surrounding government buildings.

Ukraine's Ministry of Internal Affairs published a video showing
a group of officers being suddenly attacked from behind a fence
on Monday. Petrol bombs were also thrown in the middle of police
cordons, setting officers’ uniforms on fire.

“We have seen footage in the last 24 hours of protesters
setting fire to police officers or protesters jumping on police
officers and clapping them with baseball bats, and it’s
absolutely appalling, that’s not what we should see in a modern
democratic society,” Marcus Papadopoulos, publisher of
‘Politics First’ has told RT.

Meanwhile, a five-minute walk away from the protest hub remains
Independence Square, otherwise known as Maidan - the cradle of
the two-month demonstration. Unlike neighboring Grushevskogo
Street, the demonstration there remains peaceful so far.